Techniques of Printmaking

TECHNIQUES OF PRINTMAKING

Beej admits that her interests within the broad field of printmaking are very focused. Her works are all a combination of photolithography and chine collé. Photolithography is an emulsion photo plate process that she uses to print the outlined shapes, and the collage-like technique of chine collé produces the patterns. Creating a print, for Beej, always begins with the linear image, usually ones that she appropriates from other sources and combines, transforms, and reinterprets to give new meaning. “When I see something that interests me in the newspaper or a magazine or a catalogue,” said Beej, “I put it in a file. Then I try to decide how it can become part of my voice, how to put images together to make a statement.”

Once Beej has roughly decided what she wants the print to look like and has selected her images, she scans them into her computer and uses her printer to produce very high-quality Mylar negatives. These negatives are then mounted on aluminum plates coated with a light-sensitive photo emulsion. A plate maker exposes the Mylar transparency and creates an image on the plate; this becomes the printing plate.

The printing plate is treated with oil, and Beej inks it and runs it through the press. Some of the big, linear prints take an hour-and-a-half to ink because she manipulates the density of the colors while the plate is on the printing bed. She sometimes throws colorants or glitter into the ink. Beej repeats the process with additional plates to add other elements and build up the complexity of images in the final print. Some of the prints have a series of small vignettes across the bottom, similar to a filmstrip. The vignette images complement and expand the print’s main message.

To create the areas of pattern that fill in and around the printed linear images, Beej first mounts very thin Japanese silk paper on an adhesive paper, then scans the patterns into her computer and prints them on the silk. Beej selects her patterns from a wide variety of sources. The Chinese texts in the backgrounds of some of the BodyScapes, for example, are religious chants, but Beej prints them backwards or upside down because they are not part of her message. The luxuriant plant and animal designs that tattoo the limbs and bodies of her nude lovers are reminiscent of sinuous Art Nouveau motifs of the late 19th century. The patterns of Japanese textiles are another resource of visual information. Beej hand cuts the patterned sections and affixes them to the print. She then outlines all of the elements with black or a complementary color. The last step is applying wax to the print’s surface and ironing it. Beej usually uses a clear artist’s wax, but depending on the effect she wants, she has also used beeswax to give a thicker, mistier window for the viewer to look through. This exceptional, labor-intensive printmaking process explains why Beej makes only unique prints.

Her prints incorporate Beej’s travels, her cultural awareness, her love of nudes and the linear image, and particularly reflect her fascination with the art of the Orient. The imagery is both intensely personal and instantly familiar. Her Inca Series, influenced by the work of indigenist photographer Martin Chambi, emanated from Beej’s two trips to Peru and her profound empathy for the hard lives of that country’s indigenous population. Contemporary Chinese paper cuts formed the basis of the fantasy landscapes in the Cathay Series, a visual tribute to a culture that has intrigued Beej for years.

The BodyScapes, LoveScapes, HatScapes, BrazilScapes, and other new works are provocative, sometimes unsettling, and unified by the idea of women and sensuality. The elegant shoes, large purses, and elaborate hats—or head coverings—in many of the works are unabashed yet subtle reminders of Beej’s ongoing concern for the ways women are controlled and limited by society.